God's justice in these troubling times

     One of my practises this Lenten season is to read a variety of passages before I take time to write and relay whatever it is I have to impart. Hpefully with the Spirit in the lead role. Today I took a passage that my parish had in their own Lenten reflection guide. The author of the reflection is a parishioner who labelled her commentary "Blessed are the Merciful".

     I am well aware of how at odds my idea of justice may be with that of God. Sometimes I am convinced (as many seem to be these days) that my idea of justice is right in line with that of God, as in one in the same.  At the same time I know that just ain't so. God's idea of Justice is far beyond my simple human mind and far beyond the greatest and most compassionate of human minds.

     In Jewish Scripture we might read an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. We can read justification for stoning someone who committed adultery and also for someone who wore garments of two different fabrics.  Abominations and justice of the sword and stone seem right at home with the ancients. Then Jesus comes along and changes almost everything. Don't forgive seven times but seventy times seven! If God's justice is to be seen in the land owner, God paid the workers who worked a small fraction of a day the same wage he paid those who labored hard all day long. Justice?  If someone slaps your right cheek, turn and offer him your left.  What is going on here? When will the lunacy stop!  If the Spirit is alive and well and continually revealing the love and mercy of God, what will be the next level of God's crazy justice will we be called to?

      These days, almost everyone seems embroiled in the political upheavals of electing a bigot, an idiot and his horribly unqualified team into high offices. Did you catch that? Was that a Godly moment on my part and are my calls, or any one's calls for political justice in these times even remotely close to what God would call us to do? How does God call us to act?  Dose "give to Rome" have any meaning here?

      Perhaps it will be a particularly good Lenten season then, what with the extreme challenges we face to align our vision of justice to that of God's in these troubling times. At the same time we are focusing on our personal growth and spiritual journey this Lent, like it or not we are living in a time when we cannot simply stick our head in the sand. If you have any concept of the Gospel and it's relevance to social equality and call to treat everyone fairly (as beloved children of God, one and all)  or if you know what Liberation theology is all about, we have to integrate our personal faith and our call to love and serve our fellow citizens (nationally and globally) especially in these traumatic political times.

       This will come under the heading of wow, what are we supposed to do? As children of God, we are called to, at the very least,  think about these issues and not to simply ignore them as we smile and go on with our daily lives. Perhaps we can meditate on that a bit this season. 

  

Luke 7:36-39

When one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to have dinner with him, he went to the Pharisee’s house and reclined at the table. A woman in that town who lived a sinful life learned that Jesus was eating at the Pharisee’s house, so she came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.

When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.”